American Grace

How Religion Divides and Unites Us

(Simon & Schuster; 673 pages; $30)

Is bland beautiful? Almost never, most of us would say. But when it comes to religion in a diverse society, the answer may be a surprising "yes."

This is the chief implication of the most successfully argued sociological study of American religion in more than half a century. Robert Putnam and David Campbell harvest a generation of research and mature reflection in a compelling new book, "American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us." Jammed with interesting information about how religious affiliations of all kinds divide and unite Americans of various generations, regions, sexes, educational levels and ethno-racial groups, this volume is at once an invaluable reference work and a systematically argued treatise.

Among the great virtues of this volume is its combination of two features that are all too rarely found in close proximity. One is a commitment to the most rigorous standards of contemporary social science, bolstered by statistical sophistication. Do you like multiple regression analysis? You'll find lots of it here. The other feature is a commitment to get their message across to educated readers who are put off by the excessive jargon and abstraction of most sociological studies. Only such a combination could make a 673-page tome worth the attention "American Grace" deserves.

Why does this book prompt the suspicion that bland may be beautiful? Because Putnam and Campbell argue that the decline of intense, sectarian devotion to any particular faith enables religious believers to be more tolerant and appreciative of ideas and practices different from their own.

Putnam and Campbell's central, data-driven theme is the fluidity of American religion. Americans move in and out of religious affiliations with dizzying frequency. While in other societies religious identity is more often perceived "as a fixed characteristic," they explain, in the United States "it seems perfectly natural" to refer to one's religion as a mere "preference."

All this mobility in an immigrant-receiving society with multiple ethno-religious groups creates, especially in recent years, high levels of religious diversity within families. One-half of Americans today are married to someone who came from a religious tradition different from their own, and when you start counting cousins and in-laws, you have extended families in which most people are intimately connected with several individuals from a variety of communities of faith. This reality leads Putnam and Campbell to what they call the "Aunt Susan Principle."

Just about everyone has an Aunt Susan, the kind of relative who is so saintly that you know she will get to heaven, even if she is atheist or a Presbyterian or a Buddhist or something else that you are proud not to be. Familiarity and love conquer sectarianism and breed tolerance.

The "My Friend Al Principle" encapsulates the same syndrome for acquaintances. You greatly admire your office co-worker Al. Even though he happens to be a Jehovah's Witness (horrors!) and you are an Episcopalian, you have no doubt he'll get to heaven.

Putnam and Campbell well understand that American society is sharply polarized by religion and that this polarization often parallels political polarization. They believe they have solved the paradox of how a religiously polarized society can also be a religiously tolerant society. The answer is that Americans do not get too deeply entrenched in any particular religious affiliation.

But some people do. "True believers" is "American Grace's" term for those who are intensely religious and have little use for folks with beliefs different from their own. Putnam and Campbell insist that only about 10 percent of Americans are true believers, but the true believers turn out, predictably, to be among the least tolerant of same-sex relationships, non-marital co-habitation, abortion, divorce and of all kinds of pluralism.

Even apart from these extremists, however, conservatism of this type is more prevalent within the most homogeneous and stable of religious groups, such as Mormons and evangelical Protestants, than among the most fluid, such as Jews, ecumenical Protestants and agnostics. This is where the beauty of blandness becomes visible.

Putnam and Campbell are not as forthright as they might be about the implications of their work. Clearly, they understand religion as a fine thing, providing needed networks of belonging and systems of meaning. But their research leads to the conclusion that religion is the most compatible with a diverse, democratic society if people regard it as disposable, as something you are willing to trade away.

Putnam and Campbell offer their own families as both normative and representative. Campbell is a Mormon with Protestant and Catholic ancestors. Putnam was raised a Methodist but converted to Judaism, while his sister married a Catholic and had three children, all of whom are now evangelicals. Will they all, like Aunt Susan, get to heaven? Only if they remember not to take their religion too seriously.